Mars Hill Church was a Christianmegachurch, founded by pastor Mark Driscoll. It was a multi-site church based in Seattle, Washington with 15 locations in 5 U.S. states.[3] Services were offered at its 15 locations; the church also podcast content of weekend services, and of conferences, on the Internet[4] with more than 260,000 sermon views online every week.[5] In 2013, Mars Hill had a membership of 6,489 and average weekly attendance of 12,329.[1] Due to controversy in 2014 involving founding pastor Mark Driscoll, the attendance dropped to 8,000–9,000 people per week. The church merged three of its Seattle locations and cut 30–40% of its staff to deal with decreases in giving.[2] On October 31, 2014, lead pastor Dave Bruskas announced plans to dissolve the church's 13 remaining campuses into autonomous entities, with the option of continuing, merging with other congregations, or disbanding, effective January 1, 2015.[6]

Mars Hill Church was founded in spring 1996[7] by Mark Driscoll, Lief Moi and Mike Gunn.[8] The church started at the rental house of Driscoll and his wife Grace with the blessing of Antioch Bible Church and the exodus of about 30 of its students.[9] They outgrew the apartment and started meeting in the youth rooms of another church.[7] The church had its first official service October 1996, with 160 people attending;[10] attendance quickly fell to around 60 because of discussions about the visions and mission of the church.[11]

In the spring of 1997 the church expanded to two evening services. The transition to two different congregations resulted in some anxiety and stir by members who didn't want the church to grow bigger, but it resulted in growing attendance.[12] Later that same year Mark Driscoll was invited to speak at a pastors' conference in California.[13] Driscoll's speech influenced the emerging church movement, and changed the focus from reaching Generation X to reaching the postmodern world.[14] The speech resulted in media coverage of Mars Hill Church and Mark Driscoll,[15] and put Driscoll in connection with Leadership Network.

The church continued growing. Inspired by Alan Roxburgh, Driscoll settled on an emerging and missional ecclesiology,[16] and a complementarian view on women in ministry. The church installed the first team of elders and they took over much of the work teaching classes, counseling and training new leaders.[17] Furthermore the church started a course for new members, called the Gospel Class, to ensure that members were focused on the mission of the church and that they agreed with the central doctrinal statements of the church. The class has been running every quarter since.[18] In the fall of 1999 the church had grown to 350 in attendance every week and was able to pay Driscoll full-time.[19]

As a result of the large growth of the church, their bylaws, which outlined how the church was organised, were rewritten more than once. The outcome of this process led to changes in leadership organization in November 2007. The new bylaws installed lead pastor Jamie Munson, preaching pastor Mark Driscoll, and pastors Scott Thomas and Tim Beltz as "executive pastors" who led the objectives of the church "under the authority of the Board of Directors," on which the executive pastors also served as directors. This change precipitated the firing of two pastors.

"Mars Hill leaders said in forum postings that one fired pastor was removed, in part, for "displaying an unhealthy distrust in the senior leadership." They said the other was removed for "disregarding the accepted elder protocol for the bylaw deliberation period" and "verbally attacking the lead pastor" — charges the fired pastor denied, the leaders added."[20]

In 2003, Mars Hill Church moved into a renovated hardware store in the Ballard neighborhood of Seattle.[21] In 2006, in an effort to reduce the overcrowding at its services, Mars Hill opened its first satellite campus in Shoreline. This change also marked their transition to a multi-site church, using video sermons and other multimedia improvements to the church's web site to connect the campuses.[21] Later in 2006 Mars Hill acquired two new properties in West Seattle and Wedgwood, which became their West Seattle and Lake City campuses.[21][22]

Since then, new Mars Hill locations were added using a multi-campus "meta-church" structure, connecting Driscoll's sermons via high-definition video to the remote campuses during weekly worship services. This format allowed each location to retain local leadership and ministries while under the leadership of the main campus. A fourth and fifth Mars Hill location opened in 2007, and in 2008 a sixth location was added in downtown Seattle. A seventh campus, in Olympia, Washington, opened in Fall 2008[23] and an eighth campus, the first outside of Washington state, opened in Albuquerque, New Mexico in Fall 2009. The church launched four new churches on January 15 in Portland (Oregon), Rainier Valley (Seattle), Sammammish (near Seattle), and Orange County (California), the same day as the first sermon in the "Real Marriage" sermon series, based on Mark and Grace Driscoll's book, Real Marriage.

On October 16, "black-clad demonstrators" gathered in front of the Mars Hill Church in Southeast Portland to "protest the church's stance on homosexuality." Approximately 20 protesters, "some of whom wore kerchiefs to cover their faces, shouted profanities at adults and children," and briefly blocked the entrance of the church. [24] Mars Hill Church Portland lead pastor Tim Smith expressed disagreement with the conduct of the protesters, but expressed defense of their right to free speech. [25]

In 2008 the church launched an online community-building network, called The City, to improve communication on all levels in the church. The City was purchased by the Christian publishing brand, Zondervan, before Christmas 2008.[26]

Former Mars Hill Church elders and members have criticized the church for its harshness in dealing with dissent within its leadership, citing as an example an incident during the church reorganization in 2007 where two elders disapproved of and suggested revisions to a draft version of the rewritten bylaws, which they viewed as consolidating power in the hands of Mark Driscoll and his closest aides. Both elders were disciplined and fired shortly thereafter. Church leadership instructed members of the congregation to shun the two former elders as unrepentant.[27][28] Additionally, members who have openly questioned or dissented with Mars Hill leaders have been asked to leave the church. This policy of church discipline was discussed during a lecture given on April 20, 2009 by Mark Driscoll for The Gospel Coalition.[29]

In early 2012 the church once again became a source of controversy over shunning and disciplinary proceeding when a young man under discipline released documents from his disciplinary contract to blogger and author Mathew Paul Turner. The documents include a discipline contract and an email from church leaders to the congregation directing them to shun him.[30][31][32]

In 2012 The Stranger ran an article on Mars Hill Church based on interviews with former members. The article questioned some of the church's practices, which, it claimed, are more typical of a cult than of a congregation.[33] The church responded with a series of posts on its blog.[34]

The church was affected by a series of controversies related to Driscoll in 2013 and 2014, including allegations of plagiarism later found by the Tyndale House publisher as adequately citing the work of Peter Jones. "Tyndale rejects the claims that Mark Driscoll tried to take Peter Jones's ideas and claim them as his own." [35]

Controversies also arose around Mark Driscoll's Real Marriage book, which utilized the marketing company Result Source, whose marketing methods included clandestine "bulk buying" to affect metrics on the The New York Times Best Seller list. Driscoll announced a six-week "extended focus break" in August 2014 while formal charges made according to church by-laws were investigated. The church employed public relations consultant and former adviser to Mitt Romney's presidential campaign Mark DeMoss to handle the fallout.[36] Driscoll's stepping down was urged by nine of the Mars Hill pastors in a private letter. The letter quoted respected evangelical pastor Paul Tripp as saying, of Mars Hill Church, "This is without a doubt, the most abusive, coercive ministry culture I’ve ever been involved with."[37] As of September 5, four of the pastors who signed the letter had resigned or been terminated, including worship director Dustin Kensrue.[38]

The following October, "seven elders plus one member of the Board of Overseers" were charged with investigating the formal charges brought against Mark Driscoll. The report concluded that while Mark Driscoll had "been guilty of arrogance, responding to conflict with a quick temper and harsh speech, and leading the staff and elders in a domineering manner," many of the other allegations were "untrue," and "While we believe Mark needs to continue to address these areas in his life, we do not believe him to be disqualified from pastoral ministry." [39]

The church reported in September that attendance and giving had significantly declined since the beginning of the year due to public controversies.[40] Executive pastor Sutton Turner resigned in September, citing financial issues and personal attacks.[41]

In March 2014 it was revealed that Mars Hill Church paid $200,000 of church money to a marketing company, Result Source, to place Mark Driscoll's book, Real Marriage, on the New York Times Bestsellers list. Result Source utilized "bulk buying" to affect the metrics on the New York Times Bestsellers list.[42] The Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability has stated that buying a place on bestseller lists violates its standards, but that because this happened before Mars Hill Church joined they are unable to take action.[43]

Recent revelations of unethical marketing practices used in the promotion of Driscoll's book by Result Source have triggered a lengthy response from Ministry Watch, a ministry watchdog organization.[44]

In March 2014 over twenty former Mars Hill Church pastors, led by long term and prominent former elder Dave Kraft, challenged Mark Driscoll's behavior as abusive, "unbiblical" and lacking accountability within Mars Hill Church.[45] That year many former Mars Hill Church pastors participated in a blog confessing their complicit participation in what they described as an unhealthy culture at Mars Hill, specifically an abusive leadership style by Mark Driscoll which they felt had become harmful within the Mars Hill community.[46]

In October of 2014, a group of elders released their investigation of the accusations with "some 1,000 hours of research, interviewing more than 50 people and preparing 200 pages of information." The report concluded that Mark Driscoll had never been charged with "immorality, illegality or heresy," and considered "some of the accusations against Pastor Mark to be altogether unfair or untrue." Additionally, many of the "other charges had been previously been addressed by Pastor Mark, privately and publicly. Indeed, he had publicly confessed and apologized for a number of the charges against him, some of which occurred as long as 14 years ago."[39]

In June 2014 an online petition asked Sutton Turner of Mars Hill Church and Dan Busby of the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability where the money raised through Mars Hill Global Fund actually went. [47] The church reported that "Mars Hill Church began to use the term 'Global Fund' to solicit gifts restricted for 'capital development and expansion'. As communicated in the Global Newsletter on July 7, 2009, the Global Fund was used to raise resources for the following purposes: 'start new Mars Hill campuses, plant new Acts 29 churches, and equip leaders at the Resurgence Training Center'. In the 2009-2011 time frame, over 80% of the funds given to the “Global Fund” went to Acts 29 church planting, with additional funds used for the Resurgence Training Center and church planting in India." Additionally, "subsequent to June 1, 2012, in early July 2014, Mars Hill Church sent approximately 6,000 letters and 3,765 emails to individuals who had made gifts as a global donor subsequent to June 1, 2012. In these communications, Mars Hill Church offered to redirect the donor’s gifts, made as a global donor during this time period, specifically for planting churches in Ethiopia or India." [48]

As of October 2014, Mars Hill Church met at twelve locations. A few locations were closed or consolidated on October 12, 2014. Mars Hill Church was scheduled to disband on January 1, 2015, dissolving each church location into an independent congregation.[6]

Bellevue. Pastor: Thomas Hurst. This is where pastor Dave Bruskas preaches live. As of January 1, the Bellevue campus is now Soma Bellevue. The new lead pastor is Jeff Vanderstelt from the Soma community of churches based out of Tacoma.

A Mars Hill Church elder/pastor delivering a sermon before performing baptisms at Seattle's Golden Gardens Park.

In 2013, The Church Guide released a list of the "Top Churches to Watch in America". The link ranked churches according to how much churches could learn from the ranked churches on particular topics. They ranked Mars Hill Church as #3 to learn from about church growth, #3 for innovation, #2 for church planting, and #4 overall. The list considered data from Outreach magazine's annual lists from 2004–2012 and other sources.[51]

A 2007 survey conducted by The Church Report, ranking relevance and influence, concluded that Mars Hill Church was the eighth most influential church in the United States.[52]

Acts 29 Church Planting Network[54] is a separate 501(c)(3) from Mars Hill Church but was founded by Mars Hill in 2001. It is an interdenominational network of pastors and churches from around the world whose focus is to assess and equip qualified leaders, plant new churches, and rejuvenate declining churches. The current president of Acts 29 is Matt Chandler. The offices and leadership of Acts 29 moved from Mars Hill Church in Seattle to The Village Church in Texas in March 2012.[55] In August 2014, Acts 29 removed Mark Driscoll and Mars Hill Church from the network.[56]

TheResurgence.com[57] is an outgrowth of the teaching ministry at Mars Hill Church. The intent of the ministry is to provide a large repository of free missional theology resources in hopes of serving the cause of the gospel of Jesus Christ in culture. Additionally, Resurgence announced that starting in 2008 they began publishing a line of books called Re:Lit (Resurgence Literature) in partnership with Crossway.

^Driscoll, Confessions, p 82-83: "Though our church was brand-new, we had already lost focus of our mission [...] Our attendance had declined to about sixty or seventy people..."

^Dricoll, Confessions, p 93: "Since we still could not find a Sunday morning location, we decided to split our 6:00 p.m. service into two services [...] When I told our people that we were going to grow beyond 150 people and expand to two services, some of them freaked out."

^Driscoll, Confessions, p 98: "I was not prepared for the media onslaught that came shortly thereafter. Before I knew it, National Public Radio was interviewing me, Mother Jones magazine did a feature on our church, Pat Robertson's 700 Club gave me a plaque for being America's "Church of the Week" and did a television story on us, other media outlets started asking for interviews, large denominations were asking me to be a consultant..."

^Driscoll, Confessions, p 108: "I began wrestling with his basic concept and came up with the following emerging and missional ecclesiology, which has governed our church ever since."

^Driscoll, Confessions, p 112: "The Gospel Class is a series of Bible studies that I taught to ground our people in our essential doctrines and missiology... The class has run every quarter since it began."